Fernando Jauregui Ochoa had carefully depicted himself on social media as a trustworthy and successful Central California food truck builder.
His videos drew dozens of aspiring food truck owners, many of them immigrants like Ochoa, who entrusted him with their life savings in hopes of turning their dreams into a livelihood.
But Stanislaus County prosecutors said Ochoa, owner of 8A Food Trucks, turned those dreams into a nearly million-dollar fraud scheme.
Instead of building the trucks and trailers he promised, prosecutors said Ochoa used his customers’ money for drugs, vacations and other personal luxuries.
Ochoa was known to flaunt his success on social media, including posts of him riding jet skisand standing by his black Corvette. Some victims suspect he used their money to produce a Mexican corrido that was posted on YouTube.
On Friday, prosecutors announced that 30-year-old Ochoa had been convicted of 18 counts of obtaining money by fraud with an allegation that the total fraud exceeded $500,000. Additionally, he was convicted of one count of witness intimidation and an aggravating factor that he targeted vulnerable victims based on their immigration status, according to the Stanislaus County District Attorney’s Office.
Ochoa was also ordered to pay restitution and is scheduled to receive a 20-year prison sentence in October, according to prosecutors.
“This case demonstrates the devastating impact fraud can have on unsuspecting victims,” Dist. Atty. Jeff Laugero said in a written statement. “Instead, he exploited their trust and vulnerabilities and stole from them.”
The conviction comes two years after Ochoa was charged following a report by The Times that detailed the plight of his alleged victims. Many of them had saved money while toiling as farmworkers, cooks, custodians and construction workers.
8A Food Trucks customers from across the state said the losses were especially painful because they came at the hands of one of their own.
In a phone interview Friday night, Paulina Quintal, one of the victims, said many of the people he defrauded were farmworkers, including some who borrowed money from family back home in Mexico. She said at least one victim she knows suffered a heart attack after losing her money and is wheelchair bound.
She said Ochoa’s cruelty toward his own people is what motivated her to help other victims and push the authorities to investigate him.
“I’m a legal resident, but many of the people he stole from were undocumented,” she said. “It didn’t matter to him. It broke my heart, and I told myself ‘you’re not going to get away with this, you’re not going to make a fool of your own people.’”
Quintal and her husband, Alejandro Gonzalez, were forced to close their restaurant — Mi Casita Purepecha — in San Bernardino after receiving threats that they believe came from Ochoa.
The threats, they alleged, came in early 2024 following a dispute with Ochoa over payments and ownership of a trailer they had purchased from him.
After their trailer went missing, Gonzalez drove to Ochoa’s business in Ceres, Calif., believing he had taken it. But when he arrived, the business was deserted.
Days later, he said, two men pulled up to the drive-thru and one of the men brandished a gun. The couple later claimed they got a threatening voicemail from Ochoa.
In an interview with The Times, Ochoa denied stealing the trailers and said he sent two people to the restaurant to address payment matters but not to intimidate the couple.
Gonzalez later filed a report with the San Bernardino Police Department over the theft and the run-in at his restaurant. Quintal said the case remains open.
In lawsuits and interviews, former clients accused Ochoa and his company of refusing to return their partial or full payments when they failed to deliver the trucks and trailers they ordered. Others alleged that they received vehicles so poorly built that they couldn’t be used. And some have accused Ochoa of taking back trailers they’d purchased from him.
All told, 15 alleged victims claimed more than $475,000 in losses, according to a Times analysis.
Prosecutors said the investigation into Ochoa began in April 2023, after the District Attorney’s Bureau of Investigation received multiple complaints about fraud related to Ochoa’s 8A Food Trucks company.
In all, prosecutors said more than 40 victims were defrauded of hundreds of thousands of dollars. Ochoa was arrested on April 16, 2024 and charged the next day.
At the time, prosecutors said he had defrauded about 28 victims and that the fraud totaled about $993,000. Ochoa is scheduled to be sentenced Oct. 30.
Quintal said she plans to attend his sentencing and looks forward to facing him to let him know the harm he caused.
“I’m happy he’s going to pay,” she said. “Twenty years is enough time for him to think about the harm he caused people.”
The post He stole nearly $1 million from immigrants in food truck fraud scheme, prosecutors say appeared first on Los Angeles Times.
